DGHS prepares for Ebola control

The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) is preparing the standard operating procedure (SOP) for Ebola control and treatment in Bangladesh and its first draft has been submitted to the National Ebola Monitoring Committee for review.

The Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR). A wing of the DGHS prepared the draft with the support of the World Health Organisation, said Professor Dr Be-Nazir Ahmed, member secretary at the committee.

The next meeting for SOP preparation will be held tomorrow.

Talking to the Dhaka Tribune, Dr Be-Nazir, who is also the line director of Communicable Disease Control (CDC) at the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, said: “We are preparing the SOP against our country’s context. It has to be easily understandable for everyone who will provide the treatment to patients.”

He said infection control and patient management was going to be the highest priority in the procedure.

However, when asked when it would be finalised, he said it was difficult to tell. “We are taking all-out measures to control and prevent the disease.”

Meanwhile, a workshop for journalists on Ebola disease took place yesterday at the IEDCR auditorium in the capital.

Addressing the workshop, Professor Dr Mahmudur Rahman, director of IEDCR, said careful reporting on the disease was of utmost importance at the moment.

“Bangladesh is still a low-risk country, but we have to ensure all preventive measures in advance to keep Ebola disease at bay. We have the capacity to detect it within a day if we get blood sample from a suspected patient,” he said.

“We have to be friendly with those who came back from the Ebola-affected countries. We have to convince them to give us their blood samples so that we can run tests,” he said, adding that it was unethical to disclose the details of the potential patients.

Dr Be-Nazir told the Dhaka Tribune that a total of 197 expatriates came back from Ebola-affected countries since the disease broke out. Among them, 108 have completed the 21-day observation period.